One commissioner dares to open up talks about union contract

I’ll have to eat my words.

I predicted no one would have the temerity to call for open talks about a proposed amendment to the current union contract with Clark County firefighters that was on the Tuesday agenda as a closed session.

I was wrong.

County Commissioner Steve Sisolak, noting there had been a lot of misinformation about the proposal, asked whether the matter could be discussed in public. County attorney Mary Ann Miller replied that the law allows such talks to be in secret, but nothing prevented the commissioners from discussing it openly so long as they did not vote, because that was not part of the agenda. So they talked openly.

I overheard Sisolak say later he got his butt chewed for challenging the secrecy, but, when I asked, he refused to say by whom.

The topic was placed on the agenda for secret discussion by Commissioner Chris Giunchigliani, who said in the open meeting she wanted to get direction from the board so she could take it back to the union, apparently having appointed herself a one-woman negotiating team with the union. I thought that was the role of management.

Two weeks ago the union verbally presented to commissioners a proposal to cut the annual COLA in the current contract, which expires next June, from 3 percent to 2 percent in exchange for two additional vacation days a year. The salary reduction would save $1.2 million a year, the county calculated, while the vacation days would cost $1.3 million. The firefighters also asked that the contract be extended two years and said they would forgo $4 million in security fencing. County management said the latter was no savings at all since it is a capital fund that must be spent for something related to the fire department.

Nothing has been presented in writing.

Other unions have reopened their existing contracts and made real concessions. Will the firefighters?

Talks for the next contract are scheduled to start in February if no agreement is reached.